Update on Sparkie and other stuff

I have not posted lately as I have been extremely worried about Sparkie, he has been quite lethargic, and not himself at all, also all his coat has fallen out, so I took him to my vets who said that his heart murmur had got worse and they could hear congestion in his lungs, the following Monday, he had a heart ultrasound and chest xray, and they found a mass in his lungs, my vets feared the worst and they seemed to think that it was a secondary lymphoma, as they said that dogs very rarely get primary tumours in their lungs, I was so devastated, and really just did not know what to do, I love this guy so much he has always been my heart and soul. He was referred to a heart and lung specialist who thankfully saw him the next day, so he went off to have lots of investigation including a needle biopsy in through the chest wall and into the tumour to take a small sample of it. Leaving him at the vets was awful, and that day was one of the longest I have had. When I picked him up I had a really long consultation with the specialist, who thank goodness had some better news for me, firstly his bloods all came back really good all except the white and red ones which I did not get back that day, his heart murmur is now a grade 4 which although not good could be worse, she feels that the loss of coat was down to him being on steroids earlier in the year, and they found a single cell mass in his lungs which she felt did not look like a lymphoma, now I just had to wait for the needle biopsy, I would at this stage like to thank Hannah, Nancy, Polly and Bernadette for being so kind and sympathetic, I have been in pieces and all of my friends have been fantastic to say the least.

Sparkie taking it easy and wondering what all the fuss is about :0)

I got the results back that the tumour is benign which is like a dream come true, I will have him re xrayed in about 8 weeks time to see if it has grown at all or obviously if he goes down hill at all I will take him straight back to see the specialist for for now I am fairly optimistic, and although he is still a bit tireder than usual he does seem a lot happier which makes me very very happy indeed.

Recently I have had my van carpeted by Nancy's and Andy's neighbour Micheal, and it looks gorgeous, thank you for arranging this, I am really glad that I have had it done and I cant wait now for it to go in next week to have cages put in will be all safe and snug. I will post a picture of it when it is all done.

Last weekend I went to stay at Nancy's on Friday night as it was their club Xmas dinner, all of the dogs were so well behaved, and Todd didn't disgrace himself by peeing anywhere that he shouldn't thank goodness !! Niamh really likes my dogs and it was lovely to see 12 !!! chilled out and happy dogs, Sparkie had lots and lots of TLC and loved laying by their lovely open fireplace with his new found friend Poppy :0) and I felt like I had had a little holi-day ! I was thoroughly spoilt !

Training wise, I have done little bits with both Jess and Todd, and I am really pleased ( lol lol )with a couple of bits that I have been doing, I have been trying to get Todd to go on ahead of me on the Aframe and the Dogwalk as although his contacts were nice, if I wasn't in from of him he would really slow down on both and then turn to look at me, so I have been doing lots of toy throwing and targets to give him something to focus on instead of me and it seems to be really working, I went to club on Tuesday night and he really drove on down the Aframe with me quite a way back, I just now need to carry on and start proofing them. Granma has done some work with Corrie, who really enjoyed this she even got her to bark like a sheltie grrrrrrrrrr !!!! :0))) (Corrie that is not Granma lol lol )Leah helped me do the push troughs with Jess and I have been practicing them, she ran Jess to show me and made it look so damd easy !! but I am determined that I will be able to do these dreaded push troughs !! Hannah and I have been doing some dogwalk bits too and these are looking pretty good, so here's to next year !